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Gavin O'Connor talks about role on hit RTÉ show ‘Charlie’
20 Jan 2015 : Paul Byrne
O'Connor as controversial politician Sean Doherty in RTÉ's hit show 'Charlie'
Playing the controversial Roscommon politician Sean Doherty in RTE’s acclaimed series Charlie ‘was just a dream role’ Gavin O’Connor tells IFTN’s Paul Byrne.

For good drama, it’s often been said that you need a hero and a villain. For great drama though, you can’t beat a celebrated hero who turns out to be a cunning villain.

Having served three terms as Taoiseach of Ireland, from 1979 to 1992, Charles J. Haughey was as controversial in office as he was celebrated. The celebrations soon ended after his retirement though, as further revelations of corruption, embezzlement, tax evasion and a 27-year extra-marital affair surfaced. By the times of his death in 2006, at the age of eighty, Haughey had come to represent much that is wrong with Irish politics. From hero to villain...

Which might explain why RTE’s current three-part mini-series on the fallen Fianna Fail icon, simply titled ‘Charlie’, has proven to be such a success. Then again, the series does boast some wonderful writing, solid direction and a top cast, the latter led by the likes of Aiden Gillen (in the title role), Tom Vaughan-Lawlor (as his faithful press agent, P.J. Mara), Peter O’Meara (as Brian Lenihan) and Gavin O’Connor (as controversial Minister for Justice Sean Doherty).

‘Playing The Doc was just a dream role,’ says O’Connor, the playtime clash, bang, wallop of his four-year-old son echoing in the distance. ‘There are so many books, so many documentaries, about this time, and about these people, it was just a gift, for all of us. You could dig very, very deep here, get to know the times, the politics, the people.’

‘I listened to hours and hours of Sean Doherty just to get his accent right - he’s from Roscommon, and I’m from Cork - and being able to get into that sort of real detail, it just made for an incredibly rewarding experience, from start to finish.’

And it’s proving to be a rewarding experience for viewers too, with last week’s second outing pulling in 44% of the TV audience for its primetime Sunday slot – while it’s third and final outing was watched by over 600,000 people. Written by Dublin theatre and screenwriter Colin Teevan, and directed by Kenny Glenaan and Charlie McCarthy, the Touchpaper- and Element Pictures-produced series charts three pivotal years in the rise and fall of Charles J. Haughey - the man who was plainly willing to do just about anything to become Taoiseach.

The first episode entitled Rise is set in 1979, when Haughey made the surprising leap from Irish Minister for Health to Taoiseach, with a little help, of course, from his close circle of allies. The second episode, GUBU (Haughey having used the words grotesque, unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented to describe one of the many scandals that dogged his career), is set in 1982, as Charles J. attempts to make his mark on the world stage, only to be dragged back down to Eire by some awkward home truths. In Episode three: Fall, set in 1989, Haughey is still chasing that elusive majority government, but his increasingly desperate bids for absolute power leave him exposed...

‘Love him or hate him, Haughey was a fascinating man,’ says O’Connor. ‘And he represents a very pivotal period in modern Irish history. The backroom conversations here have been charted before, but to get them up there on screen, to try and understand what was really going on, that just sparked us all.’

‘As you can imagine, working with actors like Aiden, Peter and Tom was a joy, and then, as I said, you’ve got all this wonderful research material. Peter Carson’s 2005 documentary, for one, and then you’ve got books such as [John Waters’] Jiving At The Crossroads, and The Boss, by Joe Joyce and Peter Murtagh, along with all the articles that were written at the time. The amount of stuff that we could call upon for research, it was manna from heaven, you know.’

Was it important for O’Connor to like his character, to have empathy for Sean Doherty?

‘Absolutely. Whether its’ fiction or fact, when you approach any character, you’ve got to empathise with them. And you’ve got to find the motivation within him. Whether that motivation was ambition - blind ambition, in some cases - or greed, or whatever, you have to play it. Especially with controversial figures such as Sean Doherty - and let’s be fair about it, he’s a very, very controversial man - you have to lay aside any bias you might have politically. Because you have to play it completely impartially, and completely objectively, and that’s the way I approached it. I didn’t approach the role with any agenda.’

‘When I got into the nuts and bolts of Sean Doherty, I found some wonderful things to play with. His great sense of humour, and how gregarious the man was. Despite all the flaws that have been reported about him, Sean Doherty was a very, very funny man.’

Would O’Connor’s politics have changed over the making of ‘Charlie’, especially about Haughey’s reign?

‘It is recorded history so I knew about this period already. I’m old enough to have lived through it, albeit at a very young age, so, when I revisited it, I just felt it was a fascinating part of our history. To find out how much was going on at that time politically, it was all-encompassing. It was an absorbing time in Irish political life. And this predated social media; we lived in two-channel land at the time, and these guys were superstars. They had a certain style, and they had a certain swagger, how they conducted themselves.’

When it came to the question of portraying these heroes as villains, or these villains as heroes, O’Connor is quick to point out that making such a call is not really the job of the actor. ‘It’s our job to show it as it happened, and then it’s up to the public to decide which way they fall. It’s not our job to judge. It’s our job to show, dramatically, what happened in that period. And although it’s based on true events, this is essentially a drama, and it’ll live or die by the writing, by the direction, by the acting, the cinematography, the score. It’s a very difficult era to capture, and I think we’ve done it quite well, you know.’

Which may explain why the country is hooked on the series.

‘And it’s beautiful to look at too,’ continues O’Connor. ‘The cinematography, the costumes, the set designs - I think they captured that ‘80s period beautifully, and I think we should feel very, very confident going forward, in Ireland, in regard to drama. We do have the talent here. We have the writers, we have the directors, we have the actors, we have the crews. So, we should be very, very confident about making dramas like this, and people like Jane Gogan, who commissioned this and ‘Love/Hate’, has to be applauded for her courage. For taking a punt, and commissioning something that was hugely controversial, and actually having the balls to do it.’

Does O’Connor subscribe to the belief that TV is going through a golden age? Hollywood couple Anna Faris and Chris Pratt joked at the Golden Globes recently that theirs is a divided home, as he’s NBC and she’s CBS - but they hope to bring up their kids HBO. Which is how most TV producers feel these days.

‘I think the quality is definitely there now,’ smiles O’Connor. ‘There’s no real difference between movies and TV now - it’s just the time TV has to tell stories, which is a big advantage. There’s good work going on in both, and for actors, for writers, directors, etc, that’s all that really matters - good work.’

Of his own work, I point out to O’Connor that jumping back from ‘Charlie’ to his role as Billy Wilson in 2012’s TV series ‘Titanic: Blood And Steel’ there’s just his self-penned short, ‘Blink’. How come?

‘Part of the reason is wanting to take time out to really be with my young son,’ he answers, ‘and part of the reason is that there wasn’t that much work either. We would have shot ‘Charlie’ last year, so, it’s not really that long a gap, and with the success of ‘Blink’, I’ve been inspired to write more. We self-financed ‘Blink’, and it was incredibly satisfying to get that out there. To have this idea at four o’clock one night, in my bed, heading downstairs and writing the whole thing in three hours, and then have it in the Montreal World Film Festival, where it got a nomination, that’s very inspiring. Not necessarily to produce more - that’s a very, very hard job, to beg, borrow and steal just to balance the book - but I’ve now got a massive appetite to write more. I’ve co-written a feature film, ‘While You Were Gone’, and there’s a six-part TV series too. Essentially though, my primary role is as an actor - I’m just happy to put a few more strings to my bow. It’s all about keeping your head above water.’

And the lure of Hollywood, where all your film dreams can come true...?

‘I actually lived there in 2000. I took a year out, in my twenties, living firstly in London and then LA, just to see what it was like. And, to be quite honest, I didn’t want to sacrifice my personal happiness living in a place where I didn’t want to live. Some people set out to be stars, but that has never been my intention. It’s to do good work - that has always been my intention. I just found living in London, and more-so, LA, I just didn’t like it. I love living in Ireland, the craic, the people, the sense of belonging. Everyone’s chasing the same thing in LA, and only a handful make it. That’s no way to live really, especially if you’re keen to do good work. I would never have gotten to make something as wonderful as Charlie if I was a waiter over in LA. I’d have a tan, and that’d be about it.’

‘Charlie’ is out on DVD January 23rd.





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